"disassociating" poems
Replaying a riff four times perfectly
One missed fret and the entire day ends disastrously
Replaying moments of kindness and warmth
To overcome the feverish idea that I hold no heart
Every fourth step, threes end in ******
Maimed images constantly creep
This subconscious ludovico technique
These thoughts come and go in no particular order
A seat at the table and a serviette on my lap
What if I leapt out my chair and suddenly attacked?
What if I aimed the knife towards my hand?
I constantly question if that’s who I am
I will have a picnic with her today, all joy and cheer
When these intrusive thoughts will inexplicably get near
And terrorize my attitude as well as my image
Disassociating with a perplexed and horrified visage
I’m so incredibly tired of existing
A cruel and ironic fate
I’ve missed out on so many opportunities
All because of this miserable headspace
Sep 16, 2018
Sep 16, 2018 at 1:05 PM UTC
"you are so strong"
my eyes stared into nothing,
burning with the absence of tears.
i knew there would be a point
where i could not cry anymore.
what was everyone seeing?
because all i felt was weakness,
pain,
emptiness.
my exterior was bruised and beaten
but only inside could i feel the effects.
i was not strong
i was fragile,
scared,
and vulnerable.
frustrated by words of praise
i sank deeper into my delusions,
and perfected my 'brave face'.
i was not strong
i was struggling.
listening to the vital carts
wheel in and out,
my door never a separation
but a portal to demons
wielding gurneys,
needles,
charts and machines.
i was restless in my immobility.
i was not strong
i was numb.
calling for my mother at 4:00 am
she carried my weight,
she held my hand,
she washed my hair,
she changed my clothes,
she slept, barely,
at my feet.
i was not strong
my mother was.
days piled on;
hours lost in isolation
maddening my mind
and diminishing my willpower.
with every test,
measurement,
and procedure
i felt helplessness
swallow the living light in me.
still, i complied,
i waited,
i did what was asked.
i was not strong
i was a quiet fire.
looking at my damaged body,
examining my inflamed veins.
my face was swollen,
my hair matted.
i shook in my skin
disassociating my identity.
i was not my condition
i was not my self disgust.
i can not say that i feel better
just different,
which is neither positive or negative.
reflecting on 10 days as a ghost
getting acquainted with myself,
filling in the blanks.
i was not strong
i was surviving.
Mar 23, 2015
Mar 23, 2015 at 10:49 PM UTC
towards another end
the black sky of winter postures
¬fireflies like stars by
depictions of dancing¬
ochre soil of rock escarpments
flood plains, buffalo grazing
and you smile at me as we’re driving
it seems presence always has a way of disassociating
I have so much to say
but when you’re attentive it all feels cliché
just play me piano keys and ruminations
when the storms sink the streets
and drains overflow with branches
there’s always that desire to stand amongst it
Jan 25, 2017
Jan 25, 2017 at 6:53 PM UTC
look at the stream of life, the
streaming of consciousness,
each in their own contained,
Untouchable
bubble. their private world, heading
in one direction, toward
One destination.
yet separate, disparate, diverging,
Disassociating. Why is this? as
machines show no recognition, so
too, is the car’s shell aptly
assumed; purposeful, intent, yet is this
humanity?
oh but there is not time to
Stop. to think reflect muse wonder for,
the stream continues, rushing…
flashing… by, in a droop, a mere
flutter,
of the eye. is this an
Escape?
the final great escape? or just
Life
as we know it.
Nov 15, 2009
Nov 15, 2009 at 12:39 AM UTC
Drinking
Smoking
Fingering
Partying
Dancing
Making out
I don't understand what it's all about.
Standing around a party devoid
Of any fun connection;
Annoyed by the blatant lack of direction
Among my peers. My college years
Are being spent disassociating myself
From those hell bent on doing nothing of
Importance.
Jul 27, 2013
Jul 27, 2013 at 3:02 PM UTC
Life becomes too heavy.
I feel myself
floating
a few steps behind my own body.
My mind drifts somewhere distant,
a place I cannot map.
I watch myself move through the day
like a character
in someone else’s story.
A stranger
to my own memoir.
May 12, 2023
May 12, 2023 at 12:45 PM UTC
Disassociating from life
A self-assured little leaf,
Adrift upon the dry winds of doubt
Never to land, or to be landed upon in turn
For what view is old,
May yet be born again
Through experience
Through rationál
Through the ever twisting enigma of lifes currents
For what is the finish, without the journey
For life does not have a meaning
Besides the one we give it
Jun 19, 2013
Jun 19, 2013 at 10:43 AM UTC
My name is Elan Gregory. I am mixed race writer. If you do not relate to being African American, please call me “they.”
If and when referring to me when I am absent, please call me “them.”
Because of the failure of whiteness to assimilate into blackness. The biological acceptance of being from Africa.
Because of these patterns of disassociating from humanity that is imperialism.
Because of segregation.
I am not mixed race until the others who accuse me acknowledge they are as well.
A light skinned French father and light skinned English mother make a seamless offspring that is perceived and experiences confidence being “pure white.”
Everyone is pure mixed race. Not pure black or white.
So to those that resist evolution I am “They or Them."
I have three books published. "Organic Intelligence," “Lucid", and "Escape from Liberty.”
More recently I have been solely writing poetry. It is much more efficient and intimate.
I decided to write books to try and expose the urgency of deconstructing social construction. When in the event of socially constructed human dynamics there are practical (dialectical) ways in navigating and understanding what it means to be human.
Social construction is a verb. Not finished. An enforced process. Sometimes internal. How can it stop? When does it stop? How does it feel? How did it happen? Who started them? Why?
Many of the issues in society that I thought I could influence enough to change things for the better are still becoming worse.
Poetry I feel has more urgency and immediate potency in terms of energizing new events and movements.
Jun 29, 2016
Jun 29, 2016 at 12:19 AM UTC
- Loving someone so much creates an ache in your heart.
- Your chest is tightening due to the anxiety that floods your senses.
- You keep trying not to let stupid words trigger you worse than they have.
- You can't type to save your life because you're shaking too bad.
- You're trying to cook but you end up forgetting what you're doing because you're too distracted by blind hatred.
- Your brain is overwhelmed by its' malfunctioning chemicals and you're somehow still more stable than someone with less abbreviations.
- You find that so funny but you know it's even actually kind of terrible.
- You're so confused because you, the girl who literally said horrible vicious things to someone just so they'd hate you, so you could off yourself without guilt and so they wouldn't have to attend your funeral, thereby ending a friendship in the one of most painful and selfish ways possible, are somehow considered a good person.
- You go to confession multiple times and still don't feel forgiven.
- You remember your views align much more closely with Wicca than Catholicism, but you still call yourself Catholic.
- You just don't understand why people are so stupid.
- It would be laughable if it weren't for the fact that it's technically slander.
- You can't come up with anymore feels because you're disassociating. Oops
Oct 17, 2016
Oct 17, 2016 at 4:30 PM UTC
I’m in the pool dancing and then I’m not
My mind is far and my body is static
I stand there but where?
I’m so lost but I haven’t moved
I’m at the bar talking and then I’m not
My mind is travelling and my body is marble
the words stop coming because I’m not here
But where am I?
I’m reading, devouring the chapter and then I’m Not
My eyes glitter over and my body remains
I travelled away but I don’t know where
Any empty true nothing
The world moved and progressed
The people around me walked and talked
But I stood there fixed
Thinking of nothing
Going anti clock wise in a wave of progression
I’m disassociating again. I don’t know why I don’t know where
And all I seem to do is glare
maybe into the nothingness , maybe into the past
I’m writing rhymes in my pad and then I’m not
the pen and the lines evanesce
I’d like to come back.
Aug 26, 2018
Aug 26, 2018 at 5:23 AM UTC
Can someone please just tell me how to be?
Can you explain the way I can be sought after but not obsessed over
How to love someone without clinging to them
How to feel without breaking something
How to move on without disassociating
Can someone please just tell me how to be?
So that I can stop being apologetically me
Jan 10, 2018
Jan 10, 2018 at 4:45 PM UTC
For the longest time I've kept my immediate family away from myself.
In retrospect my introversion and quietude as a child bordered on hostile. Most of the time i thought things but never said them. I now wonder if half my memories and excursions with people were all made up in my head while i sat there and said nothing. It's difficult opening up to people because no one ever asks and when they do it's never the right questions.
For a while i thought perhaps i had been autistic without even knowing but without proper diagnosis i am unable to say for sure and i highly doubt it now.
The thing is, while i very much enjoy words and nothing brings me pleasure like listening to my favorite people speak to each other while i pleasantly nod and wait for my turn in order to produce a monologue i had been preparing all the while with the proper pauses almost like i had gone back and done multiple revisions i find it difficult to banter. I am unable to jump from one topic to the next. I cannot for the life of me poetically jump from book commentary to the latest gossip as to why the barista at the local coffee shop wastes so much time talking about tattoos when all you want is your daily dose of caffeine. I must admit that this never really bothered me before. Yes, I comprehend that without dialogue it is not possible to keep relationships or even a simple job. I understand that without having anything interesting to say you will quickly lose friends and resort to whatever internet personas do all day. I've always been seen as the sensitive presence. Most of the time that I am zoning out people will agree that i'm just thinking about important things even though really i'm unable to stop myself from disassociating or even severe daydreaming at times. In fact, most of the time i am just there. However, when i'm alone without the impending life-or-death situations of being responsible for acknowledging the existence of other people there is a sense of liberation. I will go about my day hastily jumping from one task to the next. I am often bewildered by those that cannot bear being in their own company. They will seek any alternative rather than being alone and let me just say that there is a difference between being alone and being lonely and while i have felt both these with the same intensity i cannot say that which I am more perplexed by.
May 20, 2018
May 20, 2018 at 1:48 AM UTC
When you're lonely
You feel only
Lonely thoughts.
You don't wanna be stuck indoors disassociating,
I need a boring colleague.
But I've tried worrying before.
More thoughts -
I know you think I'm offshore,
A matador for you and me
Don't like your score?
Offshore offshore
May 28, 2019
May 28, 2019 at 7:00 PM UTC
Sometimes I have good days
Where I feel like sadness
Has absolutely no way of catching up to me.
But then there are other days...
Those days of blank emotions
And completely disassociating myself
From the rest of the world.
I don’t feel real.
I feel numb and loose.
And I drown myself in defeat.
These feelings-
They come out of nowhere
To a point where I feel alone
In a crowd of lonely people
Who are just trying to get by their days
With the same old routines
And the same old smiles.
Sadness is a funny thing, I guess
Oh, the irony.
Dec 5, 2017
Dec 5, 2017 at 5:00 PM UTC
Winter is cold knuckles
and
wet socks.
Closing your eyes to the cold wind
and
shaking.
Winter is not being able to
get
out of bed.
Disassociating to the point
of
mania.
Winter is standing outside
to
feel something.
Never telling anyone that you can’t
*******
breathe.
Winter is how you made me feel
deep down
inside.
I need to get in touch with
the other
seasons.
Until next year
Nov 15, 2018
Nov 15, 2018 at 11:37 PM UTC
disassociating ********
consciousness, far from here
lost amongst the clouds in the sky
as I come down, they follow me
fog lays softly upon the ground I walk on
Apr 24, 2018
Apr 24, 2018 at 12:17 AM UTC
She’s a dark enigma
But only to herself
She shines such a bright light
So kind, forgiving, beautiful
Little does a soul know
She hides so well
An evercarbon fir
She bares nothing
Skin, bone, teeth
So human but so alien
Disassociating
The abyss calls her
Asphyxiates her slowly
Wraps around her mind
Taking her away
She follows the rabbit
Everything is forgotten
A lucid life dream
Everything so tangible
But left behind
Infiltration of the mind
An inward corpse
Walk all over her
Take advantage
Dec 2, 2019
Dec 2, 2019 at 2:35 PM UTC
breathe. in. out.
what do you see?
computer-ruler-pen-calculator. sticky note. sticky note.
desk.
bag. chair.
what else do you see?
person-person--person---person----person.
who?
i don't know.
where are you?
does it matter?
who are you?
i forgot.
what are you?
disassociating.
Jan 30, 2019
Jan 30, 2019 at 2:44 PM UTC
Dreams feel like reality and reality feels like dreams
Everything is intermingling together
Been off my medicine a few days, don’t know if I’m finding myself or losing my way
I’m not going off the rails
Emotions are in check
Just disassociating coming out the wreck
Numbness and blindness the medicine creates
The things you don’t realize until it’s too late
Feb 26, 2025
Feb 26, 2025 at 12:22 AM UTC
People only like me for my short poetry
its not good,
its just things people have said to me
about the girl I love
I just wanna see some words I actually wrote
getting appreciated
Feb 7, 2016
Feb 7, 2016 at 12:19 AM UTC
You can do everything.
all the breathing exercises, all the mind calming techniques, all the grounding rituals, take all your meds at the appropriate times and with food, go to therapy, do the worksheets, make the changes, but you'll still falter sometimes.
and it could be anything, and you could see it coming and not even know you're seeing it.
it could be a song, a word, a noise, an action, anything.
for me it's the sound of rain on roofs.
and you'll fall back into the darkness and the hatred where you think no one can find you or pull you out again. You'll slip under the raging black sea, and let it consume you entirely
as black water
fills your lung
like rapids
and it burns but you let it happen.
because it was too quick, too sudden, for you to stop the water from drowning you.
you try to stand but you can't find your footing because there are no sandbars for you to stand on
only water.
and you thrash but sooner or later you're dizzy and your throat burns and everything is spotty and you can't think
and you're gone.
replaced by a shaking shell of the memory
of not being able to move your arms
and the thunder and rain drowning out your screams
and each blow to your head making it harder to make any noise at all
(and people wonder why you have memory issues)
and finally, when it's over
you're shaking and shivering and your sobs are so violent that they don't make any noise
you can't eat for weeks and when you do you just throw it right back up.
you can't look at your brother
or hug your father
and the disassociating gets so much worse that your arms bleed and ache almost constantly.
your "friends" worry, but not enough to do anything.
your teachers worry, but not enough to ask why.
no one ever asks, so you never tell.
and while you shake and shiver in the car
because you remember it all so well
and you just want it to stop
but you can't get enough air
and you're an absolute wreck,
there's light drifting down to you
through the murky black water.
it's bright and blue and warm
and suddenly you're on dry land
and can breathe
but you're looking into eyes made of galaxies and storms
and you're afraid if they see you this way that they'll leave,
because you're such a mess
but you can't pull it together.
but he found you, in that deep, dark water.
and he pulled you from it,
and helped you breathe again.
and you wish you could show some type of gratitude,
but you know that even if you said thank you a thousand times over,
you'd need a better word than that.
and you sooner or later smile,
and it's like the water and tar never took hold of you.
so maybe you can be better, with a little help.
Nov 10, 2016
Nov 10, 2016 at 1:03 PM UTC
There’s a barrier in my mind
While I try to cry over what you said last night
I know that it’s more than fine
So why the hell does it keep me up till light
The xans do little to pass the time
Hands shake ‘baby come back to mine’
My soul leaves your body, its time to fly
Disassociating our very lives
Jun 9, 2019
Jun 9, 2019 at 7:08 AM UTC
Tonight I am disassociating myself
from all the worldly belongings,
To be able to feel lighter and stronger!
Tonight I am letting go,
Not out of humility,
To be able to survive the pain!
Tonight I am getting into the dreamy shell,
To be able to get explicit clarity
on the journey called life,
Tonight I am transcending myself
from one to many ~~
Feb 22, 2017
Feb 22, 2017 at 2:45 AM UTC